The Deep State: Do You Like It? Do You Hate it?

I have to admit I did not know about the Deep State until the last couple of months or so. It seems to be something that washed up on shore along with the Trump Administration. All I seemed to know of it was that it is so well buried that people like me cannot see it.

I wonder if any of you have seen it. If so, could you tell us what it looks like? Never mind that, can you tell me if you have heard about it. If so can you tell me what it is supposed to be because for the love of Mike and Madge I couldn’t figure it out even though the word was being bandied about a lot lately.

I set out to find out.

I heard that Glen Greenwald a columnist had a recent article about it. I followed him a bit a few years back until his red tails began to show under his suave words during the Snowden incident. Glen was the type who saw a million warts on the American system of government while he stared starry eyed at dictators especially if they were followers of the red flag. He moaned whenever something happened in America that was less than perfect.

When I heard he had an article I thought that by reading it I’d understand what the Deep State is and what it was doing. If anyone would know it would be Glen I thought. His article is here.

Glen said I was wrong when I though the “Deep State” came with Trump. He explained: “the reality is that the U.S.DeepState has been reported on and openly discussed in numerous circles long before Trump. In 2010, the Washington Post’s Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist Dana Priest, along with Bill Arkin, publisheda three-part series that the paper titled “Top Secret America: A hidden world, growing beyond control.”

According to Glen the Post series documented that the military-intelligence community “has become so large, so unwieldy and so secretive that no one knows how much money it costs, how many people it employs, how many programs exist within it or exactly how many agencies do the same work.” The Post concluded that it “amounts to an alternative geography of the United States, a Top Secret America hidden from public view and lacking in thorough oversight.”

Glen told about a book “titled “Deep State: Inside the Government Secrecy Industry,” which documented — in its own words — that “there is a hidden country within the United States,” one “formed from the astonishing number of secrets held by the government and the growing ranks of secret-keepers given charge over them.”

Glen went on to say: “The belief that the “Deep State” was invented by Trump supporters as some recent conspiratorial concoction is based in pure ignorance about national security discourse, or a jingoistic desire to believe that the U.S. (unlike primitive, inferior countries) is immune from such malevolent forces, or both.”

I guess that sums me up: “pure ignorance” and “a jingoistic desire.” Glen was always good with his words.

He didn’t let up on me though when he had me down: “That the U.S. has a shadowy, secretive world of intelligence and military operatives who exercise great power outside of elections and democratic accountability . . . ; it’s utterly elemental to understanding anything about how Washington works. It’s hard to believe that anyone on this side of a sixth grade civics class would seek to deny that.” That’s probably my problem. If we had civics in the 6th grade at the John Lothrop Motley it must have been while I was at woodworking at the Eddie Eddie.

Glen tells us, including dopes like me, the unelected generals around Trump are part of the Deep State. They are in mortal combat with others surrounding Trump. He tells us that no one “has brought more death, and suffering, and tyranny to the world over the last six decades than the U.S. national security state.” Those include our generals, our intelligence community, and their allies.

I suppose I must thank Glen for the education. Glen is suggesting that since WWII it is the US Deep State that runs the country and it has brought incalculable harm to the world. As I see it though, the US has brought much good to the world not the least being a free Europe..

It follows then you either hate the Deep State because of the tyranny it caused; or you like it because you believe the US is a force for good in the world. I find the choice easy but then Glen having labeled me as he did would not be surprise. You have to be a lot brighter than me to hate America.

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4 thoughts on “The Deep State: Do You Like It? Do You Hate it?”

All governments have a Deep State. It is the bureaucracy. It will act in its own interest. Mao complained he couldn’t effect anything beyond forty miles outside of Beijing. Mayors and Governors face the same problem. It is not just Presidents. Kings once issued edicts to audible ho-hums from local nobles. “Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose.”

The deep state is what keeps John Connolly in Florida, and, Leonard Peltier in Kansas. They did not so much break the law, as they sinned against the deep state. After two FBI agents were killed in the aftermath of Wounded Knee, the deep state went into action. Peltier got banked in Leavenworth USP. He was the only AIM member the G could convict/railroad, and, there was a point to be proved. What did Connolly do that can’t be seen? Who, or, what, would his freedom threaten? Matt’s been talking about the deep state for years. He just hasn’t called it by that name. Glenn Greenwald has made the expression fashionable.